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It's the middle of the night, and Dave Strider is awake. Whether he is still awake or awake again is hard to say. Especially when you have a set of wrinkle-proof god tier clothes comfortable enough to sleep in, and sunglasses to hide behind.

He takes a seat at the bar. "ugh. coffee. it might as well be fucking breakfast time i guess"

Bar also provides him with waffles, which he eyes for a few moments before picking one up to cautiously nibble on.

Whenever Ysalwen shows up next, she has a package waiting for her. It's a mix tape, actually on a cassette and in a case with custom cover art. Each song is carefully listed on the back of the case.

Ysa's Mix Tape Vol. 1 from CarmenSandiejo on 8tracks Radio.

There's also a flash drive, which contains the song files in a slightly more useful format.

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Ysalwen receives said package, and after smiling at the cover art -- and being a tad unnerved at the possibility said beast is a real thing -- she tries to figure out what the cassette tape is. And the tiny plastic and metal rectangle.

And then she goes in search of Dave.

"I hate to say this, because the picture of the sea-wolf beast is amazing, but. Um. What do I do with the rest of this gift? I love it, and I could certainly do some research to figure out what these rectangles are for. But. Well. Here you are so I thought I would just ask?"

"oh," Dave says, blinking blearily up at her. The waffles and coffee are gone, and he's not entirely sure when that happened.

"oh shit i got so caught up in the irony i didn't even leave you instructions fuck

"it's called a mix tape. the bigger one is actually a tape with music on it by different artists all fucking mixed up together. it's a longstanding artistic earth tradition to make them for people for presents and shit the back has the list of songs on it

"the little one is a flash drive you can plug into your computer thingy karkat made you i'm sure it has the right port. that way you can bring the songs with you and you don't really need the other one but it's more fun that way."

Dave pulls an old school Walkman, foam headphones and all, out of his sylladex. "put the tape in here, stick the headphones over your ears and hit play."

"Oh! My world doesn't have any of that at all. Except songs, really. And I suppose some bards have written ballads and the like as gifts for friends and loved ones. Thank you."

She takes the headphones and fits them carefully to her ears. They don't quite cover the points but the cushioning means they fit all right anyway. For now.

"Are you all right? You look a little -- fuzzy around the edges. Metaphorically."

Hmmm.

"Play is the triangle, right?"

That's why he didn't bother with over-the-ear headphones at all, even if the sound quality would be better. Maybe he can alchemize something for her later. He went with old school instead, for extra irony.

"yup hit that button and let the sweet jams wash over you," Dave says. "like majestic ocean waves composed solely of shitty synthesizers and weird basketball metaphors. don't be afraid to call the lifeguard if you get pulled under by those sick beats"

Because yes, Space Jam is totally up first.

"I don't know," Ysalwen say thoughtfully, just before she hits play. "I'm fairly good at swimming, these days."

She has been practicing.

And then the music starts and Ysalwen's eyes get very, very wide.

"This is the one you taught me!"

"i don't wanna throw shade on our fucking incredible musical stylings and dog backup beats but sometimes you need to hear the original before you can remix it right"

Or just to believe what you're hearing, in this case.

"I don't even know what I'm hearing!"

She is talking very loudly because part of her has not registered that Dave is not hearing the music, too, just now.

"Did they really gather a huge crowd for this? Do they always?"

"sometimes you have live recordings with a huge audience that you just hear fucking screaming over everything but this is probably just a recording that they used to remix the song to make it sound that way

"i doubt these guys were ever popular enough to have that many people at a show and you can hear the difference between studio recording and live if you listen to enough music"

"What makes them different, these studio and live recordings? The audience?"

Hmm. And another question.

"Are the songs on this, um, mixtape, your favorites? Or -- "

The dulcet strains of Space Jam fade into the Beastie Boys.

Ysalwen fumbles for a way to turn the volume down. Just a tad.

Edited 2016-07-17 17:35 (UTC)

"nah," Dave says. "these are for you they don't have much to do with me just that i picked them. you said you liked the upbeat nonsensical shit so it's a bunch of nineties, hip hop and some girl power thrown in too.

"you don't have to listen to it all now," he says, but he sounds a little amused.

Edited 2016-07-17 17:59 (UTC)

"I'm going to have to ask you what all those words are, you know that, right?"

She grins, taking the headphones off.

"But I suppose I can stop listening to this wonderful gift in order to talk to you. So how are you?"

"uh lemme see

"the nineties just means a time period on my world we separate things by decade for some reason don't ask me why. i was born then so i grew up with all the music it was kind of shit but nostalgia is real

"hip hop is a kind of music i can tell you which ones are which and you'll get a feel for it eventually

"and girl power is exactly what it sounds like and there started to be bands that incorporated it into their music style. i figured that stuff was gonna be so far up your alley that it's banging on the door and waking up all the neighbors."

He pauses to breathe. "did i miss any of the slang you didn't get. i'm never gonna be able to stop using it because i'm a non-stop word waterfall but yell at me if there's something you don't get."

"Huh. We group things by centuries, or Ages, as we call them. Hence I live in the Dragon Age. You don't give your decades fanciful titles, do you?"

Her mouth quirks at one corner.

"I'm getting used to the slang, but thank you for agreeing to explain when I ask. Sometimes context cues are enough, but other times --"

So it goes, right?

"it's cool. i was chatting with this girl earlier and she was talking about all kinds of cultural shit i didn't understand we're all fucking ambassadors to each other. getting down with our bad diplomatic selves.

"and we definitely don't call our decades anything near as badass as the fucking dragon age. hell yes."

"Oh, not more diplomacy. I really can't escape it, can I."

Dammit.

Ysalwen laughs anyway.

"There are worse fates, I suppose. So."

Speaking of --

"You've never seen a dragon, have you?"

"an actual alive dragon no

"apparently the trolls had some but none of them made it into the game with us"

"Oh. We had that, too, for a time. But they started to return at the dawn of this age, so. Now we see a lot more High Dragons. Some people find them terrifying."

Go figure.

"what makes them high dragons"

Besides the obvious interpretation that has him cough a little and cover his mouth to hide a snicker.

"are there low dragons

"medium dragons"

"Well, there are dragonlings, which are the babies. And there are the drakes, which are the males. They can't fly, but they do breathe fire. Or ice or lightning, I suppose. Then there are the smaller dragons -- females that aren't of breeding age. The high dragons are the largest, and also the way they continue their species."

Edited 2016-07-17 22:48 (UTC)

"how big do they get"

"Big enough to eat you or me in one bite, if we were too slow to dodge."

"holy shit that's big all right

"not like i need further evidence of your obvious badassery but do you fight them"

Why isn't there video footage of this?

"I have, yes."

Her smile is wry.

"I would rather not, generally, because they are both terrifying and beautiful and I would hate for them to no longer exist, but. Well."

Sometimes needs must.

"One of them was an Archdemon, which looks similar but isn't at all the same, and another was a shapeshifting witch who. Um. Also comes here. But the third was an actual high dragon. I don't much recommend the fighting, but I'm not dead from it, so."

"yeah that's not on my bucket list don't worry

"i mean i don't want to fight dragons to begin with because they're huge and breathe fire not my idea of a good time

"and even if it was i don't think your bucket list is relevant anymore after you're dead that's kind of the fucking point." Dave ponders this.

"i wonder if people here make post-bucket lists"

"Bucket . . . list?"

Somewhere several trolls are probably horrified.

"I have a feeling it's not some kind of receptacle collection, right? And if you wanted, I don't think there would be a reason not to make a post-death list of whatever kind. It might keep things from being mindlessly dull. Um."